Saturday, 15 February 2014

10 actions on flooding

Reverse staff cuts at the Environment Agency (EA), increase its
budget, and drop plans to impose a duty on it to consider economic
growth, which could get in the way of providing independent expert
advice

Strengthen planning rules for urban and rural areas to prevent
further development on flood plains and ensure developers prioritise
flood resilience and prevention – including through incorporation of
Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems (SUDS) in new developments as well as
a programme of retrofitting SUDS to existing communities. Ensure better
transparency of decisions so public can hold decision makers
accountable

Get rid of any cabinet Ministers or senior governmental advisors who
refuse to accept the scientific consensus on climate change or who
won’t take the risks to the UK seriously

Increase spending on flood defences to a level in line with expert
recommendations from the EA and the Climate Change Committee (CCC),
change the cost benefit ratios required for projects to go ahead, and
simplify the process for local authorities to apply

Rethink land management policies to encourage the storage of water
in upland areas, and make flood prevention a non-negotiable condition of
all farm subsidies

Improve UK’s future resilience: Adopt proposals
for the immediate creation of a new Cabinet-level committee on
infrastructure and climate change resilience, and a Royal Commission to
set out the long-term impacts of climate change on land, making detailed recommendations as to the necessary institutional, funding and policy responses

Start paying attention to advice from the Met Office and the CCC
that climate change will lead to even more such events in the future.

As called for by Platform London and other campaigners,
redirect the billions of UK fossil fuel subsidies and tax breaks into
assisting the victims of flooding. This would free up money to address
the underspend and assist the victims of flooding, as well as putting a
halt to public money exacerbating the problem of climate change that is
making the floods so much worse.

Tackle the undue influence of big business in Whitehall and
Westminster – end the revolving door between the fossil fuel industry
and government

Step up the UK’s action on climate change, for example by committing to a binding EU-target on renewables